With the Philadelphia 76ers missing a big piece of their offense in Joel Embiid at the moment, it is important for them to be able to pick up the slack on offense in other ways.
One of those ways is 3-point shooting and they struggled mightily from deep in a 120-85 road loss to the Utah Jazz on Tuesday. Philadelphia shot just 6-for-29 from deep on the night and their main guys had a tough time finding the bottom of the net in this one.
Seth Curry missed his first seven shots on the night and he only made one triple on three attempts. To make matters worse, Furkan Korkmaz was 0-for-6 from deep, Shake Milton was 0-for-3, Isaiah Joe was 1-for-8, and Tobias Harris was 1-for-3. The Sixers have got to be able to step up and knock down those open looks.
“We missed a lot of wide-open shots, but I don’t ever worry about that,” said coach Doc Rivers. “There’s no coach in America, at least in the NBA, that worries about missed wide-open shots if it’s by the right guys. Furk had wide-open shots, Seth had wide-open shots, Isaiah had them, Shake had a ton of them, Tobias had a couple. That’s part the part we’ll show on film. What are you supposed to do? They gotta keep taking them.”
Joe, who was playing in his first game since he came back from the health and safety protocols, knocked down his first triple, but then missed his final seven. Philadelphia needs him to be able to step up and knock down those open looks. It has been a bit of a struggle for him to begin the season.
“We did miss a lot of wide-open shots,” Joe sighed. “Our defense could be better, no doubt about it, but we also missed a ton of wide open looks. The guys that normally knock down shots couldn’t knock down shots today and it’s just one of those games. We can’t let that get our heads down. We just got to go into the next game with major confidence.”
For guys like Curry and Korkmaz, all they need to see is one shot go in and they will be able to get it back. It was a tough night against the Jazz, but they have a new opportunity to move forward on Thursday when they face the Denver Nuggets to continue the road trip.
“It’s just one shot,” Korkmaz stated. “When you see one go in, it’s gonna come back. I don’t really worry about shots right now. As a team, I feel like we are struggling right now. I’m one of them also, especially in this last couple of games, but I don’t really know but shots I worry about defense more. I think I got to play better defense.”
With that being said, Korkmaz is in a pretty bad slump. He is shooting just 18.8% from deep on 8.0 attempts over the previous four games. He is one who has got to bust out and give the team a spark on that end.
“I have been through this before, it’s not a big deal for me,” he said. “I’m just gonna go to the hotel and forget about this and then focus on the next game.”
This post originally appeared on Sixers Wire! Follow us on Facebook!
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